Filtering by Tag: neuroplasticity

After an excellent American Viola Society festival last week in Los Angeles, I'm still processing the panels, discussions, and performances. One session in particular was about managing neurological conditions as a performer, including focal dystonia, which is something that musicians often fear. I've previously interviewed a musician about focal dystonia, and written about it, but I think it's good to revisit this material, both as performers and educators.

Let’s look at two words that are often used interchangeably but mean different things: proprioception and kinesthesia. According to the American Heritage Science Dictionary, proprioception is “The unconscious perception of movement and spatial orientation arising from stimuli within the body.” In other words, it’s the awareness of body position and location.

Kinesthesia is the “Sense perception of movement, the muscular sense,” meaning an awareness of how movement is performed. Proprioception is the result of sensory input throughout the body (skin, fascia, muscle, joint receptors), which then sends feedback to the spinal cord and brain.

Kinesthesia, however, is more behavioral in origin and your body is more actively involved in assessing movement patterns and making adjustments. In yoga and other movement disciplines, we need both our proprioceptive sense and kinesthetic abilities to execute tasks. In addition, the brain exhibits neuroplasticity, meaning that changes in nerves and synapses can occur, new movement skills can be acquired at any time, and there is potential for new neural connections throughout life, regardless of age.

As humans, we are often creatures of habit, often preferring repetition and predictability to novelty, from driving the same way every day to work, to performing the same set of sequenced asanas in a class or at home. Although there is still incredible benefit to be reaped from repetition and movement, creativity is what drives the brain, kinesthetic sense, and motor learning. With every new set of movement concepts or skills, there is a timeline of growth and acquisition that can be seen in the psychological model of the conscious competence matrix, used in many different modalities of learning:

Unconscious Incompetence: The student does not know or understand how to do something, and therefore does not know their own incompetence.

Conscious Incompetence: The student does not understand how to do something, but sees their own deficits and is eager to learn.

Conscious Competence: Student understands how to do something but is refining the movement and skills needed.

Unconscious competence: Student is able to execute the skill with minimal effort and ease.

Let’s apply this to a movement skill that I am still refining: handstands. When I first tried a handstand, I was convinced that I could not do one (having not done them in my youth), and had no idea where to start, thus the unconscious incompetence phase. I later started to build the strength needed in the shoulders, although my kick attempts were clumsy (conscious incompetence). A few years later, I was able to kick up to the wall, albeit not always gracefully, and able to refine my kinesthetic mastery of the movement mechanics, thus conscious competence. I think I’m still somewhere in the conscious competence phase in regards to handstanding, since it’s not yet second nature, but we’ve all seen people pike and float into handstand with no problem, thus unconscious competence. This same matrix can be applied to musical training, whether with a musical technique or concept or a selection of music.

Let’s tie this all back to yoga asanas – after a certain point, many of the traditional yoga asanas (vinyasa, downward dog, tadasana, warrior poses, etc.) become very familiar, thus unconscious competence. We may have a remembered rote sense of what poses usually “feel” like, and thus replicate a similar felt experience each time. We may no longer think about the way we execute the pose, and may be doing the poses on autopilot, with little felt sense of proprioception or kinesthesia. The same is true with musicians with warmups- I am absolutely guilty of doing the same warmup every day, and just sort of going through the motions. How can we challenge our self learning and assessments with our instruments and habits, even after playing an instrument for 15, 20, 25 years?

The solution? Make poses and movement new again and think out of the box. For movement, my favorite way to do this is with pilates and Yoga Tune Up®, as they have both been challenging for the brain and body in bilateral movements, new pose orientations, and joint explorations. For music, I invite myself to warmup by improvising- if I'm working on an excerpt, I have to remind myself to approach it as if it were new, whether that be through new fingerings and bowings, playing the accompaniment parts in the orchestra, playing along with recordings, or simply challenging myself to learn new repertoire, etudes, and concepts. Novelty challenges the brain and the body, and helps to keep us on the lifelong path of learning and growth.

This is really how my slight ambidexterity plays out. I have the handwriting of a 9 year old with my right hand, for whatever reason.

Throughout our lives, we develop patterns of dominance, strength, weakness, tightness, etc. We always eat with our right hands, or write, or cut, or whatever daily activities we engage in. The result of this is one side that is not only more skilled and the other side is lacking those skills and messages from the brain. In addition, most musicians' instruments put more strain on one side rather than the other, depending on the instrument and the setup, and constant use of the same side in dominance, music, writing, typing, texting, and mouse-use can be taxing on your soft tissues. I have the good fortune of being left hand dominant and slightly ambidextrous-I don't always notice what side I'm doing something on until someone points it out to me ("You eat with your right?" "You kick with your right?" "You put mascara on with both hands depending on the eye?"). In addition, most of the world caters to the right-handed folks, so I've learned to do everything with my right side, except write quickly and neatly.

-There has been some research that musicians who use both hands for their instrument have more connection between the right and left hemispheres of the brain than "normal" people (whoever those folks are).

- Every time you do a new movement pattern, whether in music, exercise, life, etc., you have the opportunity to create a new neural pathway. (Read about neural pathways!)

-Neuroplasticity refers to the idea that the brain changes itself, whether from trauma or training, and creates new neural pathways throughout life, but also loses certain pathways.

"Neurons which are not stimulated in these pathways tend to wither away and become unusable. These neuron cells either die or change in ways which render them ineffective. If pathways are never developed, they never become usable in the sense that they can handle significant traffic in terms of electrochemical communication within the brain. If neuron cells are not used, they can be lost. "

I am by no means a brain whisperer, but I do love a good movement challenge, especially if it challenges the fine motor skills. So here's your activity challenge: Use your non-dominant side for daily activities!

Sleep on your opposite side (if you're a side sleeper)

Brush teeth with other hand

Eat with other hand (and open fridge with other hand)

Hold cup with less used hand

Use doorknobs with less used hand

I've been trying the left handed mouse for my writing lately, and it's fun and slightly discomfiting.

Put your mouse on the other side of your computer and use your left hand (tough but worth it!) Or use your left hand for track pad usage on a laptop.

If you play a string instrument, try playing your instrument on the opposite side. Yes, this is crazy and will sound dubious, but try it and see! The same could be true for many other instruments as well (sorry piano and voice).

If you're a wearer of makeup (male or female, no questions asked), try applying makeup with the opposite hand, provided you have time to remove it. This is often very curious.

Gaining a new awareness of your habits and proclivities will not only give you the opportunity to strengthen new parts of the body, but also to change your motor skills and brain, which is always a good thing, and is something often needed when injury strikes. In addition, challenging your fine motor skills in such a detailed way can expand your proprioception and awareness of your body, which is always helpful. Try these things for fun and notice your experience!